Clarence Martin Wilbur (1908 – June 18, 1997) was an American

sinologist Sinology, also referred to as China studies, is a subfield of area studies or East Asian studies involved in social sciences and humanities research on China. It is an academic discipline that focuses on the study of the Chinese civilizatio ...

. He was the George Sansom Professor of Chinese History at

Columbia University Columbia University in the City of New York, commonly referred to as Columbia University, is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Churc ...

from 1947 to 1976.

Biography

Born in

Dayton, Ohio Dayton () is a city in Montgomery County, Ohio, United States, and its county seat. It is the List of cities in Ohio, sixth-most populous city in Ohio, with a population of 137,644 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. The Dayton metro ...

, Wilbur went at an early age with his parents to China, where they worked with the

YMCA YMCA, sometimes regionally called the Y, is a worldwide youth organisation based in Geneva, Switzerland, with more than 64 million beneficiaries in 120 countries. It has nearly 90,000 staff, some 920,000 volunteers and 12,000 branches w ...

. He returned to Ohio for college, graduating from

Oberlin College Oberlin College is a Private university, private Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college and conservatory of music in Oberlin, Ohio, United States. Founded in 1833, it is the oldest Mixed-sex education, coeducational lib ...

in 1931. His first job after receiving his Ph.D. from

in 1941 was with the Field Museum, in Chicago, where he prepared for publication a study of plant migration left by Berthold Laufer after his death and developed a monograph on slavery in the

Han dynasty The Han dynasty was an Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China (202 BC9 AD, 25–220 AD) established by Liu Bang and ruled by the House of Liu. The dynasty was preceded by the short-lived Qin dynasty (221–206 BC ...

. After moving to Columbia University in 1947, he was instrumental in turning the graduate program into one of the nation's leading programs and supervised many graduate students. He was also active in building the study of China as a profession, and in 1971 was elected president of the Association for Asian Studies. His focus of research was Republican China, especially the career of Sun Yatsen and the rise of the Nationalist Party. He was also a central figure in organizing the Columbia Oral History Project. Upon his retirement in 1976, his students presented him with ''Perspectives on a Changing China: Essays in Honor of Professor C. Martin Wilbur on the Occasion of His Retirement'' ed. by Joshua A. Fogel and William T. Rowe, Westview Press (1979)

Major publications

* Berthold Laufer, C. Martin Wilbur, ''The American Plant Migration'' (Chicago, 1938. Anthropological Series. Field Museum of Natural History, V. 28, No. 1 Publication 418). . * C. Martin Wilbur, ''Slavery in China During the Former Han Dynasty, 206 B.C.-A.D. 25 '' ([Chicago, 1943. Field Museum of Natural History. Publication, 525). 490p. ; reprinted, New York: Russell & Russell, 1967 . * C. Martin Wilbur,'' Sun Yat-Sen, Frustrated Patriot'', Columbia University Press (1976) . * C. Martin Wilbur, ''The Nationalist Revolution in China, 1923–1928'' (Cambridge; New York: Cambridge University Press, 1984). . First published 1983 as chapter 11 of John K. Fairbank, ed., ''The Cambridge History of China'', volume 12. * C. Martin Wilbur and Julie Lien-ying How, ''Missionaries of Revolution: Soviet Advisers and Nationalist China, 1920–1927'', Harvard University Press (1989) * ''China in My Life: An Historian's Own History'', (edited by Anita M. O'Brien) M.E. Sharpe (1996)

References and further reading

* * Rowe, William., Fogel, Joshua, & Zelin, Madeleine (1997). C. Martin Wilbur (1907–1997). ''The Journal of Asian Studies'', 56(3), 878-878. doi:10.1017/S0021911800035282 * Madeleine Zelin, "C. Martin Wilbur May 13, 1908—June 18, 1997," ''Chinese Studies in History ''33.1 (1999/10/01 1999): 91-93. https://doi.org/10.2753/CSH0009-4633330191

Notes

{{DEFAULTSORT:Wilbur, Martin 1908 births 1997 deaths Oberlin College alumni Columbia University alumni Columbia University faculty Presidents of the Association for Asian Studies Children of American missionaries in China Educators from Dayton, Ohio